Life Lessons | Autonomy | How to Have Sex
Bare Boobs, My Choice — Locker Room Rules
Men working in the locker room aren’t keeping me from dressing down
The locker room isn’t just for selfies. I know, I know. It’s a surprise to me, too. There are lockers to put stuff in, toilets, sinks, showers, outlets, waste baskets, and wide, low tables where I put my clothes every time I get naked.
My boobs fall free in the locker room twice every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. This started two weeks ago, when I began going to water aerobics to attempt to heal from injuries to both of my hips earlier this year.
Of course, I could enter the gym with my bathing suit already covering my birthday suit, but I don’t mind. I suppose you could say it’s in my blood.
This is the moment when I give a big shoutout to my mom for teaching me that nudity is my choice.
Much to my early chagrin, my mom got naked without care whenever and wherever she wanted. She had no shame.
She entered the locker rooms behind our swimming lessons with poise where she would strip down to nothing, her mother’s breasts falling full and low with love and use.
Top and bottom exposed, she’d move and walk with a confidence that I didn’t understand in my youth.
But today I understand it. I understand it in women’s locker rooms while workmen vacuum the shower drains.
My mom was and is a teacher. She taught me a lot when I knew she was teaching me, but I didn’t know she was teaching me in the locker rooms, too.
She never tried to hide herself or her nakedness. Her breasts, her body hair, her stretched skin from three children. None of it was kept from us. None of her was off limits to our eyes or anyone else’s.
I learned what women looked like from my mother. I learned from her movements and exposure that my boobs were mine, just like hers were hers.
She had self-esteem and self-image issues just like every woman I know, but she didn’t let that keep her from dressing down when she needed to.
Last Monday, I was coming out of the pool after a rough morning and a rougher night when I almost tripped over a sign that said, “Men Working in Women’s Locker Room.”
The woman next to me commented with disappointment about skipping the showers, but it didn’t phase me. I thought of my mother.
She would have the determination to get done what she needed to get done, bared breasts and all.
And so I did. I showered two stalls away from the blaring sound of a plumbing hose, wrapped myself in a towel, and flipped and flopped my way to the lockers for my close-up.
Okay, I didn’t take my towel off and strut around, but I did get dressed, massaging lotion around top and bottom before I covered first one and then the other.
My boobs enjoyed open air for long enough. Just long enough for me to wonder what a man with a vacuum might think if he walked past.
Didn’t she see the sign? He might think.
I appreciated my resolve, channeled my mother, smiled with respect, winked at my bare ladies, and then slid into my bra and sweater.
I’m proud of my breast heritage.
When it comes to baring it all, I get to choose.
I’m Brett Jenae Tomlin, The Anxious Enthusiast.
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